oof

Well, COVID-19 has eaten all my traditional spring gardening outings. The Spring Garden Fair is cancelled, and per order of the Governor, all nurseries are closed until at least April 30 (to be re-evaluated then). The garden centers at Big Orange and Big Blue are still open — I may brave Orange to get a few bags of my usual mushroom compost.

Thanks to Jannine Cabossel over at giantveggiegardener for the updates, and leads on alternate plant start sources!

How about some pictures? All the dead growth from last summer in the east bed was bugging me, so I took down the bamboo "fence" and cleaned everything out the other day. What day? Who knows anymore? I've been at home (except for dog walks) since March 22 and working from home full time since March 16. The plants don't care about coronavirus tho. The earth tilts on its axis, days get longer, the plants come back. 💚

Before



During (oh, hi there, Philadelphus!)



After

2019 Garden Fair | weekend update

Garden Fair! Construction is finally done at the fairgrounds, so all the exhibition spaces were back. However it seemed like fewer people and vendors. I guess the past 2 years have taken a toll. Met up with Janet who, based on my stories of previous years' crowds, also thought it seemed sparse.)

But the Farministas were back! I got the usual Robeson and Sungold plants! Plus 2 dill starts! $18 (tomatoes $6 each (price hike!), herbs $3 each, no discount for multiples).

On my way out, I gave Janet directions to NM Plant Co (she was looking to get many many geraniums). Then I headed to Big Orange, got some new gardening gloves and 2 bags of mushroom compost. Swung by Plants of the Southwest, but didn't get anything. Need to get a new straw bale for tomato mulch.

Last stop was Waterwise, ended up with:

• 2 Salvia pachyphylla "Mulberry Flambe"
  
• 3 Callirhoe digitata Winecups
  
• 2 Echinacea purpurea "Pow Wow Wild Berry"
  
• 1 Salvia greggii "FlowerKisser™ Dark Shadows" (purple)

This year's cultivars all sound like nail polish colors, or maybe fruity cocktails. I plan to put them all in the front sidewalk bed.

Weeded the side yard, and some of the back yard by the shed. Then had to get ready to meet friends up at MoIFA for the big Girard exhibition preview. Drinks and buffet dinner afterwards at SFI.

weekend update

The employees-only area with the propagation greenhouse and demonstration garden behind the sale greenhouse
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Today was the last day of the spring sales at Waterwise, so I went over in the morning. Selection was pretty picked over, but verything was buy-two-get-one (same-size pot). So I grabbed the last four leadwort (Ceratostigma plumbaginoides) and two poppy mallow (Callirhoe involucrata) in the 2.5-inch pots. Leadworts (leads wort?) will go in the front door bed, not sure about the poppy mallow. Maybe in the backyard to fill in the blank place where some of the primrose croaked over the winter?

Also got eight 5-inch pots of blue grama grass (Bouteloua gracilis "Blonde Ambition"). They were buy-one-get-one. The plan is to divide each grass in two, so I'll have sixteen plug-type starts to fill in the bare spots in the yard the dog has dug up ... ? Will need to put up some temporary fence around them.

2018 Garden Fair | weekend update

Oh, hi there! This is Taylor, our new dog. She very much enjoys being in the backyard, digging holes in the “lawn” and the east bed, under our bedroom window. The crossed bamboo stick barrier that I put up there last summer to keep Cheyenne out provided zero impediment to her. I've acquired an expandable willow trellis thing to use as edging/fencing in an attempt to keep her out of there.

Also, Taylor had some ... disturbing? poops Saturday morning, so we hot-footed it over to the vet (she is doing well, got a wide-spectrum gut-bug killer and is on a week of colon-soothing pills). I ended up missing prime tomato-buying time at the Garden Fair while waiting at the vet (Bram missed helping set up for Free Comic Book Day at Big Adventure Comics as well). Luckily, my in-laws were there first thing and picked up the requisite Sungold and (lacking any Robesons available for purchase) Black Krim tomato plants for me. They refused to disclose the price, extracting only a promise of tomatoes as repayment. Hopefully the row cover I ordered will thwart any Curly Top Virus-spreading bugs.

I did, however, go over to Waterwise on Saturday to get (in retrospect, probably too many) perennials for the east bed:

• 5 Penstemon pinifolius
• 3 Penstemon "Dark Towers"
• 3 Sedum spurium "Dragon’s Blood"
• 3 Salvia nemorosa "May Night"
• 3 Agastache "Desert Sunrise"
• 3 Agastache rupestris "Glowing Embers"

Why do all these cultivar names sound like they're from a Dungeons and Dragons campaign?



Dug in 2 bags of mushroom compost, and set out the pots. Will attempt to plant them after work sometime this week. Need mulch — gravel, preferably.


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weekend update

oooof. So sore. But that's what I get when I skip a weekend. Actually, last weekend Bram took on the front yard weeding, the side-and-back-yard weedwhacking, and hitting the patio bindweed with Roundup. Thanks a million for that, sweetie. 😘

This past Friday I went back to the last of the Waterwise wholesale-to-the-public sales and picked up a few more things; 3 Rozanne geranium for the front door bed; 3 pineleaf penstemon (Penstemon pinifolius) for the northeast bed outside our bedroom; and 3 Turkish speedwell (Veronica liwanensis) for groundcover around the back yard flagstones.

Front yard: Planted the new geraniums and the leadwort I picked up three (!!!!) weeks ago in the front door bed. Mulched with compost. Rejoiced at all the apricots on the ground. Turns out I needn't have worried about shaking them off.




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Back yard: Northeast bed (bedroom bed? what do I call this?): Saturday, dug up as much dirt as I could from around the sumac stump, using the shovel and the pick mattock I picked up this week (ran into Dorothea while I was there at Big Orange! 💕). Monday, turned the hose on the stump for a bit and excavated by hand with the little trowel, cutting roots as I went with the loppers and the pruning saw. Plan is to get a farm jack to pull the remaining stump out. Should also mix in some sand to improve the drainage. Crusher fines for mulch would also be nice, especially for the penstemon, they hate wet ground. Agh, I really need to get those plants in.






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Raised bed: Cut back daylilies — they look kind of hilarious/alien with just flower stalks left and no leaves, dug up a few Maximilian sunflowers to try to make more room for the tomatoes, sent rootstock to Mom! Dug in compost, planted tomatoes and basil (the thyme and Persian basil from NM Plant Co croaked). Mulched with straw (Bram picked up a new bale at the Feed Bin for me) and set up cages. Skipping the soaker hoses this year, instead will water by hand in raised bed (and bedroom bed). Dug up some arugula volunteers on Thursday for a co-worker. Chives and thyme are blooming.


[photo by Bram]


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Yard: The arugula is out of hand and already starting to flower. I hacked off a trash bag-full and brought it in to the office on Friday, for the usual giveaway. I managed to get it all gone, but it was work. Note to self: don't bring pounds of arugula in before a long weekend, most everyone bugs out a day early to get a 4-day weekend.


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2017 Garden Fair | weekend update

So, apparently, there was construction going on at the Santa Fe County Fairgrounds that severely impacted the spaces where the Garden Fair is held. There was only one building open (usually there are two, plus various outdoor spaces), so there was only maybe one-quarter the amount of vendors/exhibitors as usual, plus only the main plant sale. The Farminista ladies were not there! No food trucks! Boo! Fortunately, there were tomatoes in the main plant sale. Unfortunately, even though I got there by 9:30 am, they had sold out of Sungolds! Gah! I panicked and grabbed two Robesons ($4 each). It was nutso, and really crowded, with everything crammed into a too-small space. Ran into the ever-fabulous Bev, Kathy, and Paul B.!


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To salve my disappointment, I engaged in some additional retail therapy on my way home. First, I stopped at Plants of the Southwest and got a Littleleaf Mockorange (Philadelphus microphyllus). Earlier this spring we had Coates Tree Service out to do some work, including removing the three-leaf sumac outside our bedroom window — it was seriously encroaching and causing problems. The mockorange will take its place.



I've been reading Nate Downey's PermaDesign blog, and back in April, he posted a piece about David Salman, the founder and former president of Santa Fe Greenhouses. (Even though the Santa Fe Greenhouses retail location has been closed for years, High Country Gardens, their mail-order branch, is still going.) Nate's blog post mentioned that Salman is still growing plants for his wholesale business, Waterwise Gardening. Which has public sales! Which I stopped at, after Plants of the Southwest! It was fairly busy, with one greenhouse full of mostly perennials, including a bunch I had on my list to check out as other plantings to go with the mockorange! Judging by the ID tags in some of the plants, Salman still raises plants for High Country Gardens. So these were the same ones I had been considering mail-ordering, for less money, and no shipping fees! Woohoo! I kinda went a little nuts:

• 3 Husker Red penstemon (Penstemon digitalis Husker Red)
• 1 Blue Fortune agastache
• 2 Sunset agastache (Agastache rupestris)
• 3 Serpentine columbine (Aquilegia eximia)
• 3 Leadwort (Ceratostigma plumbaginoides), for the front door bed
• 1 Rosemary

Plus a bag of Yum Yum Mix.


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The day's haul:



Then, at home, I started the cleanup in front yard, weeding the sidewalk bed and along the other side of the driveway. I also trimmed up the chamisa, deadheaded stuff, and trimmed back the yuccas that were encroaching the sidewalk. Then I took a rake and shook a bunch of apricots off the tree. I'm really worried with the amount of fruit that's set and still seems viable, even after the hard freeze we had the other weekend. Sigh. Two-and-a-half hours. Front yard itself is still in need of some serious weeding, but I was tired and the bin was full. Next weekend, I guess.





Also: Happy Birthday, Mom! 😘